alls out extraordinarily abundant, as in
the spring of 1880, when a skipper immediately on arriving at
Magdalena Bay caught 300 of these animals at a cast of the net. Of
the whales thus killed not only the blubber and hide are taken away,
but also, when possible, the carcases, which, when cheap freight can
be had, are utilised at the guano manufactories in the north of
Norway. After having lain a whole year on the beach at Spitzbergen
they may be taken on board a vessel without any great inconvenience,
a proof that putrefaction proceeds with extreme slowness in the
Polar regions.

[Illustration: THE WHITE WHALE. (_Delphinapterus leucas_, Pallas)
After a drawing by A.W. Quennerstedt (1804). ]

With its blinding milk-white hide, on which it is seldom possible to
discover a spot, wrinkle, or scratch, the full-grown white whale is
an animal of extraordinary beauty. The young whales are not white,
but very light greyish brown. The white whale is taken in nets not
only by the Norwegians at Spitzbergen, but also by the Russians and
Samoyeds at Chabarova. In former times they appear to have been also
caught at the mouth of the Yenisej, to judge by the large number of
vertebrae that are found at the now deserted settlements there. The
white whale there goes several hundred kilometres up the river. I
have also seen large shoals of this small species of whale on the
north coast of Spitzbergen and the Taimur peninsula.

Other species of the whale occur seldom on Novaya Zemlya. Thus on
this occasion only two small whales were seen during our passage
from Tromsoe, and I do not remember having seen more than one in the
sea round Novaya Zemlya in the course of my two previous voyages to
the Yenisej. At the north part of the island, too, these animals
occur so seldom, that a hunter told me, as something remarkable,
that towards the end of July, 1873, W.N.W. of the western entrance
to Matotschkin Schar 20' to 30' from land, he had seen a large
number of whales, belonging to two species, of which one was a
_slaethval_, and the other had as it were a top, instead of a fin,
on the back.

It is very remarkable that whales still occur in great abundance on
the Norwegian coast, though they have been hunted there for a
thousand years back, but, on the other hand, if we except the little
white whale, only occasionally east of the White Sea. The whale
fishing which was carried on on so grand a scale on the west coast
of Spitzbergen, has the